


He's no hero

by Livesinbooks



Category: The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: Angst, First Kiss, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Self-Doubt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-16
Updated: 2018-04-16
Packaged: 2019-04-23 20:35:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,458
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14340411
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Livesinbooks/pseuds/Livesinbooks
Summary: Ralph finds out that some people don't really like the Elongated Man





	He's no hero

**Author's Note:**

  * For [42_42_564_knock_on_deaths_door](https://archiveofourown.org/users/42_42_564_knock_on_deaths_door/gifts).



> Barry and Iris are just best friends  
> Set some time before Episode 17 but idk when exactly so just think of something

###### 

> _He sucks_

###### 

> _Remember when he let that child get hurt? He’s no hero_

###### 

> _Elongated Man? More like Elongated Loser_

Ralph closed the website on his phone and threw it on his desk in his office. He had been reading an article that had been published recently when he had noticed the community comments underneath said article.

And some were positive, but a lot weren’t. And it hurt. Ralph got up and grabbed his jacket. He needed some coffee now to forget the hate.

But at Jitters he stood in line behind two arguing friends.

“Even Killer Frost has a drink now. Elongated Man should get one too!”

“No, dude, he’s stupid. And his superpower is totally gross.”

“A little. But he’s helping the Flash!”

“Yes, helping. He’s just a sidekick. And not even a good one. I hope they don’t write comics about him anytime soon.”

“Now don’t be like that, I like him.”

“You also think maths isn’t a bad subject.”

“It isn't!”

Ralph stopped listening then and gritted his teeth. Ouch.

 

After getting coffee he made his way to Star Labs to see if someone was already there. DeVoe had been quiet the past days and there wasn’t any lead on the missing bus metas, so Team Flash didn’t have much to do.

Ralph met Cisco in the Cortex who was working on something and just made “Shh!” when Ralph said good morning.

So the Elongated Man left the Cortex and wandered around in the hallways, sipping his coffee.

He wasn’t sure why people disliked him so much. They didn’t even know him as a person. If they did, then he’d understand. But they only knew his hero persona.

After finishing his coffee Ralph put on a smile. He wasn’t going to ruin the others’ day just because of some negative feedback.

 

The next days Ralph couldn’t help but be overly vigilant concerning negative comments about him. And he heard them a lot as he paid attention.

Even in Star Labs. Harry making a quiet remark to Cisco about how silly one of Ralph’s comments was.

Iris rolling her eyes at him annoyed after he cracked a joke in hopes of making the others laugh and distracting from the way he almost flinched each time he heard a negative comment.

Even Barry and sweet Caitlin sometimes just couldn’t keep being nice and told him to stop.

But stop what? Being Ralph? Being who he was? Stop coping with the negativity by making fun of it and himself and everything?

Ralph had no idea how to do that. So he just continued. But it got harder, especially when he heard all the praise for The Flash each day.

He wasn’t exactly jealous, but he felt worthless besides Barry.

And nobody noticed. He felt as alone as he hasn’t in months. He was tempted to seek comfort at the bottom of a bottle again, but so far could still keep himself from doing so.

He felt like none of his effort was appreciated. He didn’t even stop to think that maybe that wasn’t true and that he was simply only listening to the negative comments.

He got worse with every comment he found online. But the comment that made him go back to drinking for the night was from a person he remembered: Laura's mother.

Laura, the little girl he didn’t safe because he had been so focused on catching The Black Bison.

He found the comment on a website about metahumans.

###### 

> _Personally, I don’t understand why The Flash keeps working with the Elongated Man._  
>  He proved that in a situation where he has to decide if he wants to catch the villain or save innocent civilians, he wouldn’t choose what a real hero would choose. I know this incident happened a while ago, but I can’t just forget about it. I almost lost my daughter because of this “hero".  
>  Maybe he changed by now. I don’t know. But if I had to choose, I would rather call The Flash for help. Or one of his other partners.  
>  I simply can’t trust Elongated Man and wouldn’t advice any of you to trust him. He proved that he’s not worthy of it.  
>  Usually I give people second chances, but not when my daughter could've died because of them. 

Ralph got up from his desk, walked over to the shelf and grabbed a bottle of warm beer from next to it, emptying it in a few sips. Since it didn’t help much he searched his whole office for more but couldn’t find more.

He had stopped drinking after all...

So Ralph grabbed his phone again and left the office, returning to Star Labs for the night and going directly to bed, trying to keep his shit together even though he felt like crying. Because Laura’s mother was right.

 

The next morning Ralph didn't want to get out of bed for a while, too tempted to hide the whole day, so he ended up being late since he still got coffee from Jitters without facing the others first.

Coffee in one hand, he sprinted into the cortex, stumbled over his feet and sent his coffee flying and spilling onto a stack of papers.

Harry started cursing and yelling while the rest of team Flash looked away or rolled their eyes.

“You always have to ruin everything, don’t you?”, Harry ended his angry monologue.

Ralph grinned. “At least something I’m good at, huh?”

He noticed Barry looking at him with a frown and let out a laugh. Humour was still helping him keep the others from seeing his pain.

The rest of Team Flash didn’t seem to notice how much he actually meant his words and went back to what they’ve been talking about before.

But whenever Ralph looked over at Barry, the speedster was watching him.

 

When Ralph left the cortex that day to go to his little room downstairs, Barry followed him.

“Ralph? Can I talk to you?”

The Elongated Man shrugged. “Sure, what’s up?”

He stopped and turned to Barry. The speedster looked worried.

“Are you okay? You did seem distracted since a while now.”

Ralph grinned. “Sure! I’m great!”

Barry didn’t look convinced.

“If something is bothering you, you can talk to me.”

“I know, I know. But I’m fine. Nighty night!”

Ralph continued walking and this time Barry stayed behind.

 

Logically, Ralph knew that he had fans too and not just haters. But the next days his mind focused even more on the negativity.

When there was a new meta – not one of the bus metas though – he couldn’t properly concentrate and screwed up.

Barry ended up getting hurt in plain sight of other people and the reaction was there the same night.

###### 

> _He's gonna get the Flash killed!_

###### 

> _This stretchy dude is so useless, seriously_

###### 

> _Go away Elongated Man, Central City doesn’t want you!_

And Ralph was just glad that nobody was in Star Labs anymore except for Harry because he started crying like a baby.

 

Ralph felt horrible the next day. Barry had gotten hurt because of him. Barry, his friend. And people were right, he’s useless.

But if Ralph left, DeVoe would find him and take his powers and probably hurt Barry again.

So Ralph had to join the others in the cortex again. He even managed to gather the energy to grin a few times and crack jokes.

“For God’s sake, Dibny, shut up and let me work here! You’re being useless again! Go sit in some corner and make your stupid jokes there,” Harry eventually snapped.

Ralph tried to smile through it, but he just couldn’t do it anymore. He turned around and left the cortex.

“Harry, that wasn’t nice,” he heard Caitlin before he was around the corner.

 

He had just reached his little room and grabbed a box of donuts to cheer himself up when the tears broke through the carefully constructed wall around his heart.

The box fell to the ground and he sunk to his knees next to it, wrapping his arms around himself.

He had tried so hard to keep it together, to not start crying. This wasn’t like him. He didn’t cry so much. He joked and laughed about it!

But it was just too much. He was in pain. Because he was a complete failure and if he wasn’t in danger because of DeVoe they'd definitely throw him out.

Ralph was crying so much he didn’t hear the footsteps. He only realised he had forgotten to lock the door when Barry spoke up.

“Ralph? Hey, it’s okay, you know Harry, he doesn’t mean it.”

Ralph thought about running away from Barry, but that was a pretty stupid idea. Running from the fastest man alive.

So he just curled up in himself and didn’t reply.

He thought Barry had left until he sat down next to Ralph and wrapped an arm around him.

He didn’t say anything, just held him. But that was more than enough and it didn’t take long for Ralph to calm down again.

He sniffled and wiped over his face. “I dropped my donuts, that’s definitely worth crying, don’t you think?”, he asked with a strained grin.

“Ralph, drop it and talk to me. What’s wrong? You know you’re not useless. Why did Harry's words made you cry?”

“I didn’t cry because of Harry's words!” Not only.

“Come on, you wouldn’t be crying because of donuts you dropped.” Barry was watching him too attentively for his comfort. And with too much concern in his eyes. It weakened Ralph's defence system.

“I’m fine! Perfectly fine!”

His phone made a sound and he pulled it out, hoping it'd be a valid excuse to get Barry to leave.

But it was a notification from the metahumans website. He had written an own comment about how maybe Elongated Man was still learning, but that he'll never be as good as the Flash. Someone had replied to it.

###### 

> _Still learning? He should give up right now and just jump off a bridge_

Ralph's phone fell out of his hand and he broke into sobs again. Barry picked up the phone and scrolled through the comments on the site concerning the Elongated Man in superspeed before sighing and pulling Ralph into a proper hug.

They sat in silence on the cold floor for a few minutes until finally Ralph stopped crying. For now.

Barry didn’t fully let go of him, simply leaned back a bit to look at him.

“They don’t know you. They’re probably just jealous because they don’t have superpowers and aren't working with the Flash.”

“If they knew me, more people would hate me.”

Barry looked so genuinely hurt by Ralph’s words that the Elongated Man turned pale.

“What’s wrong? Is your leg hurting again? Caitlin told you, you need more rest-"

“Ralph,” Barry interrupted. “My leg isn’t hurting. My heart is. Because you think so little of yourself.”

Ralph scoffed. “I’ve known myself my whole life, Barry. I know myself the best, so my view on myself is the most accurate one.”

“It’s not. You see yourself the way you want to. And you apparently only acknowledge your mistakes and failures and completely ignore your success and the progress you’re making.”

“What progress? You got hurt during the last mission because I was distracted and stupid.”

Barry sighed and softly rubbed Ralph's shoulders.

“Yes, you were distracted. Yes, I got hurt. But the moment I got hurt you snapped out of your thoughts and prevented me from worse injuries or even dying. We caught the meta, thanks to you!”

If he’s honest, Ralph hadn’t even realised this. He had been so focused on worrying because of failing that he completely ignored the fact he had stopped a metahuman.

Ralph started shaking then. The floor was really cold. Barry got up and helped Ralph up too. They sat down on the bed then after Barry closed the door.

“When did this start?”, the speedster inquired softly.

Ralph shrugged.

Barry took his hand softly.

“Please, talk to me. Tell me.”

Ralph’s reluctance crumbled and he sighed before starting to tell Barry quietly how it had started and then progressed.

Barry listened without interrupting. When Ralph was done he looked at him for a few moments. Then Barry took his hands in his own and started naming good things Ralph did.

“You helped me get on that helicopter the day I told you I’m the Flash.”

Ralph looked away and listened.

“You saved Caitlin and Cisco from the Trickster and his mother. You worked together with Cisco when I couldn’t keep the city safe. You got me out of prison.”

Ralph chewed on his lip. Yes, he'd done all those things. But could that really be enough to make up for all the times he had failed and will fail?

He asked that question aloud after Barry was done.

“Yes. Of course they make up for your mistakes. You’re just human, Ralph. With superpowers, but still a human brain. You can’t be perfect. Of course you sometimes screw up, but you keep trying. And that’s what counts. You keep trying and you succeed. The important thing is that you never give up. Keep going and keep trying even if you fail at first. Okay?”

Ralph shrugged. “Okay...”

Barry squeezed his hands. “Look at me,” he said softly and Ralph did.

His heart skipped a beat at how deep Barry’s eyes were and with how much warmth they looked at him.

Something in his belly moved that felt like butterflies. Well, not literally of course.

Ralph felt heat creeping into his cheeks. He realised how close Barry was and that he had never thought about Barry in that way.

But now that he did, he realised just how amazing Barry was as a human being. He had followed Ralph down here, had been holding him without asking questions as he had been crying and had been ensuring him that he wasn’t just useless.

Barry wasn’t just a hero because of his powers. He was also a hero because of his heart.

Barry cupped Ralph's face with one hand and smiled at him softly.

“Do you feel better now?”

It was obvious that Barry wouldn’t make a move right now. He wouldn’t use Ralph’s weak emotional state. But when Ralph saw Barry’s eyes shifting to his lips, he smiled and thought: “Just go for it.”

He wrapped his arms around Barry’s neck and kissed him instead of replying. 

It took Barry a moment, then he kissed him back and the kiss quickly got more passionate.

And no matter how much Barry's words had helped Ralph feeling better, nothing was as soothing and reassuring as being kissed by The Flash.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to 42_42_564_knock_on_deaths_door for the story idea!  
> I hope this is what you imagined :3
> 
> If more of you have prompts you would like me to write, you can leave a comment!
> 
> Also, I love Harry, I just had to use someone to hurt Ralph and Harry does have a lose tongue sometimes


End file.
